


As the Sky is Blue

by igrab



Category: Hamlet - Shakespeare
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2009-12-20
Updated: 2009-12-20
Packaged: 2017-10-04 16:56:49
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,292
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/32410
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/igrab/pseuds/igrab
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>There's only one thing that Hamlet knows for a certainty.</p>
            </blockquote>





	As the Sky is Blue

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Azpidistra](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Azpidistra/gifts).



He'd thought that, when you were dying, you would stop caring. About everything. Because you'd be dead soon, and you wouldn't have to care, anymore, unless some sick fuck poured poison in your ear and you had a son to avenge you. Hamlet didn't have that. And, on some level, he was right. He didn't give a fuck about Denmark, or the throne, or who did what to whom, because he was dying, and he didn't have to care.

But there was _one_ thing he still cared about.

He didn't know where his own strength came from, and he didn't know that his eyes flashed with cold fire as his hand gripped Horatio's, white, clawlike, demanding. "As thou'rt a _man_," he hissed, his words slurring just slightly as the poison took hold, "_give me_ the cup. Let _go_ Horatio, by heaven, I'll have it!" His voice was a wretched, cruel snarl, and he'd thought, that when you're dying and the world is bleeding all around you, that you wouldn't have to care, about anything. But he was wrong.

He knew that Horatio would listen to him, would heed his last words. He knew it with a certainty beyond anything else in the world.

[ + ]

"But we don't _know_, really," he remarked as Horatio pulled him along, his head tilted back so he could squint up at the sky. He hadn't been outside in a week - or was it two? He couldn't remember, though he knew Horatio kept a record of it, somewhere. Intellectually he knew that it was winter, but he could still feel warmth seeping into his skin. It was probably just the shock of it all.

Horatio was laughing, and that brought him a little back to reality, as it always did. He couldn't for the life of him remember what they'd been talking about.

"We know that the sky's blue, Hamlet," Horatio said with a scoff, and ah, that's what it was. The color of the sky as a basis for certainty. One of those sayings, and Hamlet had been thinking a lot about blue.

"But the color I perceive as blue and the color you perceive as blue could be completely different," he muttered, eyes tracking a bird as it winged across the sky. "Your blue could be my orange."

"My - " Horatio stopped in his tracks and laughed, and Hamlet walked right smack into him, and had to grab his arms to steady himself. "But it wouldn't _matter_, would it? No matter what we see, it's still blue."

Names for things. That's what this was all about on some level, like how some people called it love and some people called it friendship and some people called it heresy. Hamlet liked to think of it in terms of the basics of survival. He needed Horatio like air.

He was still talking, and trying to pull away a little, so Hamlet let him go - but not without a sense of disorientation, because everything was relative and if he let go of Horatio's arms, maybe he wouldn't've been there at all.

"...Anyway, the point of the saying is that the sky doesn't change color, whatever that color that we _happen_ to see might be." He was flicking little odd looks to him, like maybe he wouldn't've minded if Hamlet hadn't let him go, and _that_ made him smile like the sun.

He cocked an eyebrow, then flicked his eyes up, indicating the wintry sky. "It's a bit grey today, though, don't you think?"

Horatio threw his hands up and cursed loudly, and Hamlet shrank back into his furs with a sparkling grin. Point made, he thought. And I love you, too.

[ + ]

"You must tell them - "

"Hamlet, if you won't let me die with you - "

He gripped harder. "Horatio, if you love me, you'll - " he stopped, ears still damnably cocked for the wider world to turn against them. Someone was coming. "Who - "

"Fortinbras," Horatio muttered, refusing to let go of Hamlet's hand. "Pay them no heed. You - "

"From England? I cannot - this poison - " he cursed again, shuddering like a wretch in his friend's arms. "Tell him - more or less - what happened. Live for me, Horatio." He screamed at his eyes until they opened, until he could _see_ him, in a startling and brutal clarity.

"I will."

[ + ]

He found him in a windowsill, of all places.

First he saw a shoe, and it occurred to him that it was a very familiar-looking shoe, and - oh, hello, Hamlet. Windowsill. Right.

He had one leg nearly touching the ground, and the other was tucked up under his chin, with his arms wrapped around and around it like if he squeezed tight enough, it'd stay that way. Like if he wasn't holding on, maybe the world would break and he'd fall through the cracks.

Horatio touched the edge of his sleeve, brow furrowing. "Hamlet?" he ventured in a tentative sort of way, not sure if this was something he really shouldn't be sticking his neck into, but then - Hamlet had never turned him away before.

"Wh- oh." He started, and his eyes were a little wide and a little cold, now, more like ice than the summer sky that Horatio was used to seeing. He was used to seeing Hamlet smile. This was different.

"What's wrong," he asked softly, leaning close with the wind as it whistled down the drafty corridor.

Hamlet's eyes glassed over and for a moment, Horatio could have sworn he saw hostility in them, or at least a wary confusion. And then it was gone.

"My father," Hamlet spoke, in a tone that was far too even for such an admittance. "He is dead."

Horatio fancied he could feel his own eyebrows hit the line of his hair. "Dead?"

"Yes," his friend said distantly, as if they were talking of nothing more pressing than the weather. "Illness, they say."

"Ah." Horatio wasn't exactly on personal terms with the Danish court, but he had been under the impression that Hamlet's father had been in fairly decent health. Apparently he was mistaken. "I suppose you'll be leaving soon, then."

He couldn't pretend that the thought didn't make his heart sick with worry and regret. The odd Prince was so very dear to him, and he felt a sort of responsibility, for his well-being. Many in their class had a low opinion of Hamlet's aberrant philosophical mood swings, and Horatio thought of himself as a sort of buffer, to protect him from the harsh realities of the world. It was perhaps not the best thing to do, but when you fall in love, you often don't find yourself with much of a choice.

But Hamlet was startlingly _present_, even if he didn't seem to be taking this seriously. "No," he whispered, and his eyes darted to the unruly lock of Horatio's hair that was constantly distracting him. "I shan't. That is to say, my uncle wishes me to continue my studies here." He grinned then, and there was something impish in it, something delightful.

"Hamlet," Horatio murmured, "you can't stay here because of _me_."

But Hamlet kissed him then, right out in the open corridor. And Horatio knew, beyond a shadow of a doubt, that his life belonged to the Prince of Denmark, now. However their lives might take them, he would only ever belong at Hamlet's side.

[ + ]

His voice choked in his throat, and his eyes blurred with tears. He wouldn't let them fall, not yet. There would be time enough for all that. He whispered, like it was any other night, like they were rolled up in Hamlet's bedroom with nothing but starlight between them. "Good night, sweet prince, and flights of angels sing thee to thy rest."

As Hamlet died, he smiled.


End file.
